By Amanda Junk

For The Herald Bulletin

ANDERSON — Hoosier cream pie, old-fashioned cream pie, desperation pie: No matter what you call it — or how you slice it — sugar cream pie is a favorite across the state.

And thanks to a proposal by a group of Ball State students and the Indiana Foodways Alliance, it’s about to become official.

A resolution adopting the dessert as Indiana’s official state pie is expected Friday — National Pie Day — and would make Indiana the third state to have an official pie, according to the American Pie Council.

Indiana Foodways Alliance Executive Director Susan Haller hopes the resolution will bring national recognition to keep food jobs in Indiana. The effort is also a step toward branding the state as a culinary tourist attraction, she said.

“We make wonderful food in Indiana as part of the breadbasket. A lot of times with these fun things (pie) people notice and then purchase them,” she said.

Designs on food

Wesley Jeffers of Anderson is a big fan of Hoosier foods. But the northern Indiana native never gave much thought to sugar cream pies until he started work on the Indiana Foodways Alliance Web site as part of a Ball State Business Fellows project in fall 2007.

He knew his mother, who on occasion bakes the pie, had a recipe for it and he knew he enjoyed eating it, he said, but as a Business Fellow he learned more than a few crumbs of historical and geographic information about what is soon to become the state’s official pie.

“I knew it was mostly rich and sweet, but from working on the project I learned sugar cream pies are not too prevalent beyond the borders of Indiana,” Jeffers said.

Jeffers said another perk of working on the project was partaking in crumbs of the edible variety. He remembers several meetings that involved taste-testing sugar cream pie and other Hoosier food staples including persimmons, pork, peppermint and popcorn.

Jeffers worked on designing graphics for the IFA Web site until spring 2008. While he wasn’t directly involved in drafting the proposal to make the Hoosier pie’s name an official one, he said it’s one he supports.

“It’s something that’s truly a signature to the state and this just reminds people to try it while they’re here,” he said.